City of Sydney: Sydney Square’s $35m upgrade paves the way for a transforming city

> New paving, seating and lighting will revitalise the tired square between Sydney Town Hall and St Andrew’s Cathedral, as the transformation of public space across the city centre continues.

> The City of Sydney will begin work on the $35 million upgrade of Sydney Square and its surrounding public areas in 2027.

https://news.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/media-releases/sydney-squares-usd35m-upgrade-paves-the-way-for-a-transforming-city

#cityofsydney #sydney #nsw #betterstreets #publicsquare #urbanplanning

"The creators and backers of the campaign aren’t remotely interested in the social justice interests of their potential viewers—only their dollars and eventually their votes. It’s a campaign as underhanded as they come, and we should call out its duplicity wherever the campaign airs or appears."

#religion #PublicSquare #SuperBowl #ReligiousRight

/3

"A deeper look into the origin and purpose of the ad campaign reveals that it is bankrolled by radical religious extremists pressing an agenda that is precisely the opposite of what the ads convey. …

Taken together, the He Gets Us ad campaign portraying Jesus as progressive revolutionary is a dangerous Trojan horse intended to capture and sway the spiritually curious into supporting a radical right-wing, Christian agenda."

#religion #PublicSquare #SuperBowl #ReligiousRight

/2

Jay Kuo writes about those super-pricey Jesus at the Super Bowl ads,

"Big game ads are notoriously pricey, and the idea that Jesus needs a slick marketing agency and $20 million dollars to get His message across felt cringey. It also drew concerns from those monitoring the activities of the religious right."

#religion #PublicSquare #SuperBowl #ReligiousRight

/1

https://statuskuo.substack.com/p/jesus-at-the-super-bowl

Another crazy stressful day at the #corplife conglomerate. Opened #Mastodon for the first time today to see folks sharing joy, being creative, peaceful discourse. Everyone’s behaving!

This is the #PublicSquare we’ve all been waiting for. SM used to make me feel worse. Somehow now I feel better. Thank you, friends! 🥰

Did you know I think you are all wonderful and amazing? Well, I do. Here's some photos for your hard work <3

#streetphotography #cleveland #ohio #people #playhousesquare #hamilton #bakery #publicsquare

@geekaren

Indeed, it’s a wonderful place, a true #publicsquare. Makes you wonder why we stayed on the #birdsite…

It was never going to be a #publicSquare was it? It’s a private property!

One of the things that makes this #PublicSquare better than that other one everyone is talking about is that #JohnMastodon lets us write private notes on our view of "people's" accounts.

Can admins see those notes? I was going to ask my admin, but of course I imagine they can and I don't care. I've worked too much around national security and such that I'm not a big fan of too much privacy since transparency can provide so much more equity, but like I said, I do like to make a note to remind me who said what and such.

The Atlantic$ - The Childish Drama of Elon Musk - Yet again, an important part of the #PublicSquare is controlled by a #narcissistic #toddler By Tom Nichols https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2022/12/the-childish-drama-of-elon-musk/672496/ #birdsite

@atomicpoet I think we have a lot of different meanings in these words. For T==tPS, Public is not ownership, but about where people are and ease of access. Not just centralized but “centrally located in social systems.” The “Square” marks a mental space. Journalists using Twitter increases the sense of “public-ness” in a self-reinforcing way. This #publicsquare metaphor is important though. It’s why EM wanted to buy it. And even “the” is important in this metaphor! 1/3

This is the content - it regularly pops up here in the #algorithm-free #fediverse - that I am here for - and staying here for.

Even before Elmo took control of #birdshite, it was throttling us all - deciding for itself what we all saw & experienced. That is NOT how a grand public square should be.

It's not how it's going to be going forth. Long Live The Fediverse!

#writing #writers #WritingCommunity #photography #publicsquare

https://lor.sh/@mvyugo@mas.to/109416284493968952

It's true that any #PublicSquare will be controlled by some form of #authority, whether orderly civic institutions or Mad Max gangster law. But the degree to which that authority is democratic, benign, fascist, or malignant can certainly vary greatly.

I would take a #utilitarian definition of what constitutes #democratic: an institution is democratic to the degree that its decision-making reflects the will of the most stakeholders most affected by those decisions. #Mastodon #federation

t's true that any #PublicSquare will be controlled by some form of #authority, whether orderly civic institutions or Mad Max gangster law. But the degree to which that authority is democratic, benign, fascist, or malignant can certainly vary greatly.

I would take a #utilitarian definition of what constitutes #democratic: an institution is democratic to the degree that its decision-making reflects the will of the most stakeholders most affected by those decisions. #Mastodon #federation

@irwin Rich dudes have been buying literal, physical, formerly-public squares in London for 2 decades. In Salt Lake City, several blocks of Main Street were sold to the LDS church and privatized as a non-public promenade subject to restrictions on speech, dress, and last I checked, gum chewing. All to say, what the public square is and isn't does seem to fluctuate in both time and space, and sometimes what a thing was remains unclear until it is lost.

#publicsquare #privatization #enclosure

I like the feel of this more than “that app” but the fact that Twitter is going down over a rich man’s tantrum shows how powerless we really are.

I hope this app takes off greatly.
##twitter ##publicSquare

We are in the weirdest of timelines, in which small-scale harm reduction uses an incentive that shouldn't exist to solve a problem that shouldn't either. This initiative is both objectively a win and also manifestly bonkers.

This is what happens when the nonprofit sector, including its faith wing, is left to inhabit what policy discourse has abandoned

#hunger #poverty #guns #publicsquare

Oh, and then there's this point as well, via @redfrog #Twitter #PublicSquare

https://mamot.fr/@redfrog/109330909604999250

Please inform those who #needMoney desperately to this one weird trick that ***really does work***!

Hold up a sign in a #publicSquare:

I USE GITHUB TO DEPRIVE HUMANITY OF ART, PLEASURE AND JOY.

#griftHub #mIcrOSOft #cheatingHumanity #microShaft #humanity #art #pleasure #joy

Please inform those who #needMoney desperately to this one weird trick that ***really does work***!

Tell them to hold up a sign in a #publicSquare tha

I DEPRIVE HUMANITY OF ART, PLEASURE AND JOY WITH MY GITHUB ACCOUNT.

#griftHub #mIcrOSOft #cheatingHumanity #microShaft #humanity #art #pleasure #joy